Guild Wars 2

TL;DR: This post has an idea to encourage event completion and open world exploration by introducing a % based map control mechanic.

Each zone needs to have some sort of morale or control rating to indicate the respective factions’ control of the map. Krytan zones could have a “Seraph Control Index,” Orrian zones could have a “Pact Control Index,” Ascalonian zones could have a “Legion Control Index.” These ratings can vary from 0 to 100%, depending on the share of contested waypoints that are opened or closed and the number of events that succeed or fail in the area.

When this rating increases, various bonuses are granted to all players in the map. These bonuses, or “morale boosts,” include buffs to attack damage, armor, HP, gold find, karma, experience, and magic find. When this rating reaches 100%, the strength of these buffs increases significantly.

Various factors cause this rating to increase.
- Completing events
- Successfully defending a contested waypoint
- Opening a contested waypoint
- Opening a dungeon

Various factors cause this rating to decrease:
- Failing events
- Failing to defend a contested waypoint
- Failing to defend a dungeon

These factors are weighted differently. Successfully completing a random event may add +1 points to this rating. If you open up or defend a contested dungeon, this may add +20 points to the rating because it is much more significant. On the other end, failing an event causes -1 points to the rating, and failing important event chains may incur an even larger penalty.

Repeating the same event over and over will not be able to give a 100% morale boost as long as waypoints and other areas are in control of the enemy. In addition to these morale boosts, there are further encouragements for players to constantly attack areas held by the enemy or defend areas under attack. Certain events (typically ones involved in capturing or defending waypoints) reward medals that can be redeemed for karma, skill points, rare materials (T6 and lodestones), and special armors/weapons. The number of medals that is awarded varies depending on the difficulty of the event. In addition, bringing a zone to 100% control awards the player a certain number of medals, which can be gained daily for each zone.

This sort of feels like I stepped back into Factions. ‘x’ npc won’t talk to you because you hold more ‘y’ faction than ‘x’ faction. Not sure how I feel about that. Always annoyed me when my side was losing….

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

This sort of feels like I stepped back into Factions. ‘x’ npc won’t talk to you because you hold more ‘y’ faction than ‘x’ faction. Not sure how I feel about that. Always annoyed me when my side was losing….

It’s nothing like that. When the map has low morale, you have no boosts. That’s it. As you gain more map control, you gain more boosts. The idea is to encourage people to:

1. Bring events to completion rather than deliberately fail them.
2. Complete events in different parts of the map
3. Open and defend dungeons so that constantly having to guest to other servers where dungeons are open is less common. Opening dungeons is a serious collective action problem right now.

TheKillerAngel.3596:

It’s nothing like that. When the map has low morale, you have no boosts. That’s it. As you gain more map control, you gain more boosts.

My only concern with this theory, would be how to deal with the less populated maps? Should players be penalized with the lack of boosts because the map doesn’t get the amount of traffic another one gets? Just food for thought.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

TheKillerAngel.3596:

It’s nothing like that. When the map has low morale, you have no boosts. That’s it. As you gain more map control, you gain more boosts.

My only concern with this theory, would be how to deal with the less populated maps? Should players be penalized with the lack of boosts because the map doesn’t get the amount of traffic another one gets? Just food for thought.

In theory, less populated maps would become more populated with this, as people would enter more areas to get medals. I added something at the end of the original post.

An interesting thought line. I’m not against it. Its also something that could easily lend itself to a small scale test as well, to see if it could be successful.